Trapped

Directed by Dawn Porter, this documentary looks at a new front in the antiabortion battle: state legislation that targets women’s health clinics with prohibitive regulation. Clinic owners in Texas and Alabama explain how so-called TRAP laws (Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers) mandate stricter inspections, require any abortion doctor to have admitting privileges at a hospital, forbid operation of a clinic within 2,000 feet of a school, and more. “You never get a break,” says one clinic owner in Huntsville, Alabama. “You’re going from one battle to the next.” Needless to say this has drastically reduced the number of facilities available to women, and clinicians share stories of teenage rape victims being turned away because there aren’t enough doctors available. The rank hypocrisy of conservatives using government regulation to shut down independent businesses is topped only by the white pro-life activist outside one clinic who shouts at an African-American doctor, “Black lives matter!”
ByJ.R. Jones